Order errors
We want to make it right, even if the order isn’t.
When things go wrong, we want to make it right
Customers are looking for convenience, merchants are doing their best to fulfill orders quickly and correctly, and delivery people are busy on the road making deliveries. Usually, it all goes right. But when it doesn’t, a happy order becomes a sad order—fast.
That’s why we have support procedures in place to resolve customer issues on your behalf—fairly and efficiently. Sometimes, this means issuing refunds to customers who have had bad experiences. In these instances, your business may be held responsible for those refunds in the form of order error adjustments made to your payouts.
Protecting against fraud
We take fraudulent behavior seriously and have filters in place to monitor both customer and delivery person behavior—we will not make adjustments on suspicious refunds.
Excessive refund request rates
We track customer refund history and block customers who abuse our refund policy—which varies from region to region—from submitting these claims.
Photo evidence required
We require photos to be submitted in many cases as evidence before making a refund decision.
Escalation circumstances
We escalate cases to a trained team for investigation and review before making refund decisions for requests that are:
- Not filed in a reasonable time frame
- For high-value orders
- For orders with alcohol items
- For first-time customers
Minimum satisfaction ratings
We enforce minimum delivery person satisfaction ratings from both customers and you, our merchants. If a delivery person has low satisfaction rates, they will be removed from the platform.
Excessive missing item rates
Delivery people who have a significant number of missing item reports associated with their deliveries are automatically flagged in our systems. Partners are not charged for any refunds associated with deliveries from these delivery people.
Order error adjustments
Most orders placed on Uber Eats go off without a hitch, thanks to our merchants, delivery people, and customers. A small portion of orders have errors reported by the customer, the delivery person, or the merchant. Order error adjustments are the eligible customer refund costs that are deducted from stores' payouts for circumstances within merchants’ control, and after fraud checks.
These are the customer refund costs that are deducted from stores' payouts to cover order errors:
Customer may be compensated
We resolve customer errors fairly and on your behalf, sometimes issuing Uber credits or providing refunds.
Partners may be charged
Some refund costs may be passed to merchants after fraud review and removal of cases with extenuating circumstances.
Possible partner charges when customer refunds are given
Missing items
Customer did not receive an item, or part of an item, that was ordered.
Incorrect items
Customer received an item, or part of an item, that was not as ordered.
Incorrect orders
Customer received incorrect order. This includes where one customer in a batched order reported their entire order was wrong and no other customer in the batch reported that their entire order was wrong or contained an inaccuracy.
Undelivered orders
Customer never received their order (i) when using your own delivery staff, (ii) because your store was closed (but marked open on the app) and customer’s order was not prepared, and /or (iii) because your store had closed (despite you initially accepting the order) when the delivery person arrives within 30 mins after menu closing time.
Late deliveries
When using your own delivery staff, customers received their order approximately 70 minutes or more past merchant’s estimated delivery time.
Not partner charges, even when customer refunds may be given
Late customer reports
Errors reported more than 48 hours after order was placed.
Fraudulent activity
Errors on orders with possibly fraudulent customers or delivery people.
Undelivered orders
Customer never received order (unless using your own delivery staff).
Suspicious deliveries
Customer received incorrect order where delivery person had multiple orders at once, delivered in less than half the ETA, or delivered far from the dropoff.
Damaged orders
Customer damage complaints (e.g., tampered packaging, spilled liquids).
Food condition
Customer poor food condition complaints (e.g., food arriving cold).
Late deliveries
Customer late delivery complaints for orders delivered with Uber delivery people.
Food quality
Customer food quality complaints (e.g., food taste or integrity).
Calculating and monitoring adjustments
Order error adjustments include the cost of food sales (including tax/VAT) at the time of order. They do not include other fees that may be refunded to the customer. To make it easy for you and your team to stay up to date on this information, we include order error adjustment details in multiple places. (Please see the Monitoring tab below.)
Please note: a customer might not report the order error in the same week the order was fulfilled. In those cases, adjustments may be reflected in subsequent weeks' reports.
Order error adjustments calculations
The amount adjusted on your payout will range from a portion up to the full cost for the item(s) with errors at the time of the order, including tax/VAT. For partially missing or incorrect items—often related to combo meal items that have an entree and side or drink included—the a la carte cost of the missing or incorrect portion of the item will be adjusted from your pay.
Please note: we retain the full Uber Service Fee for the entire order.
Fees your business will not be charged for
You will not be responsible for any delivery fees or bag fees charged to the customer.
Your downloadable Order Error reports
Just go to your Uber Eats Manager portal and check the Reports tab to download the Order Errors (Transaction) report. This downloadable CSV file includes a row for each order error with detailed info such as issue type, item(s) in error, customer refund amount, merchant charge amount, and amount covered by Uber.
Your downloadable Payment CSV files
Also available in the Reports tab of your Uber Eats Manager portal is the option to download the Payment Details report to reconcile payments. This downloadable CSV file includes a row for each order error adjustment, plus any associated tax.
Your Uber Eats Manager Payments tab
You can review the Payments tab of your Uber Eats Manager portal to see if there are any adjustments listed. If any adjustments occurred, you’ll see a red indicator box that says Order Error next to the relevant orders. By clicking into the order, you can see the reported error and the breakdown of your adjustment and net payout.
Your weekly Payment Summary email
For your convenience, we email you a weekly Payment Summary, which includes a section that details order errors, explaining what went wrong, and shows a timestamp of the order for your reference. Scroll to the bottom of your Payment Summary to view these details.
Minimizing order errors
We’ve gathered some best practices from merchants on how to minimize the errors that could potentially lead to customer refunds and adjustments.
Up-to-date menu
Log in to your Uber Eats Manager portal to ensure that your menu is up to date with the correct customizations and prices.
Printed receipts
Check off items on a printed receipt to confirm that the contents in the bag are accurate.
Tamper-evident materials
Seal each order bag with tamper-evident materials when an order is complete.
Order number
Write the 5-digit order number on the bag for easy identification.
Number the bags
If there are multiple bags in a single order, number the bags (“1 of 2” and then “2 of 2,” etc.).
Handoff
Double-check during handoff that every bag gets picked up by the correct delivery person.
We’re always here for your business
While we’re confident that our policies and principles for order errors are robust, we’re always willing to review cases where you feel there may have been mistakes.
Please note: we require you to use the dispute button in the Orders tab in Uber Eats Manager to submit a dispute request within 30 days of the order date. We aim to resolve disputes within about an hour; you can use the tracker to know when to expect a response. All disputes will be evaluated individually. We cannot guarantee reversals in every situation.
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